Despite the recent advancement in medical technologies, an effective cure for blindness has not been devised yet. Blindness is not limited to a mere loss of a visual function but is a disease seriously affecting the patient's mental life and social life. Therefore, technologies for curing blindness are acutely demanded.
One of the blindness cure technologies is implemented in an artificial eye system designed to replace the function of a diseased part such as the retina or the optic nerve with an artificial entity. In general, the artificial eye system comprises an extracorporeal image receiving element and a nerve stimulating electrode implanted in an intracorporeal region. Image information received by the image receiving element is transmitted to the brain via the stimulating electrode. Therefore, at least an image information transmission system for transmitting the image information and a power supply system for supplying power to the electrode are needed.
However, the study of the artificial eye system has just started. Something, which is movable with a user (blind patient) and has the image information transmission system and the power supply system combined appropriately, has not yet been available.
The present invention has been made in view of the above circumstances and has an object to provide an artificial eye system which has excellent usability and is practically feasible.